Crypto Market Maker CEO Slammed with 8-Month Prison Sentence in Massive Wash Trading Scandal

Aleksei Andriunin, the mastermind behind crypto market maker Gotbit, just got hit with an 8-month prison term for orchestrating a mind-blowing multi-million-dollar wash trading scam that pumped up trading volumes across various cryptocurrencies.

U.S. District Court Judge Angel Kelley in Boston didn't hold back, dropping the hammer after Andriunin copped to wire fraud and conspiracy to manipulate the market back in March 2025.

This 26-year-old dual citizen of Russia and Portugal got nabbed in Portugal in October 2024 and was shipped off to the U.S. in February 2025. In a jaw-dropping plea deal, Andriunin agreed to cough up $23 million in stablecoins stashed in crypto wallets tied to Gotbit.

Gotbit Consulting LLC, the company he launched, also got slapped with five years of probation and has to shut down for good.

The company owned up to running wash trading gigs from 2018 to 2024, jacking up trading volumes to make client tokens look hot and land spots on exchanges and CoinMarketCap.

Gotbit's Sneaky Blockchain Dodge

Prosecutors spilled the beans that Gotbit used a bunch of accounts to slip past blockchain surveillance, raking in tens of millions in client cash for their shady services. The tokens caught up in this mess? Robo Inu and Saitama.

Company bigwigs Fedor Kedrov and Qawi Jalili got indicted too.

Gotbit marks the third crypto market maker to get nailed for dirty trading tricks, following the takedowns of MyTrade and CLS Global, as per the Justice Department.

The Securities and Exchange Commission isn't messing around either, throwing down a separate civil enforcement action against Gotbit for breaking securities laws.

As part of his sentence, Andriunin's got a year of supervised release coming and is banned from anything crypto-related during that time.